1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cart for carrying a computer and more particularly, to a compact computer cart that can easily be assembled without tools and that saves much storage space when not in use.
2. Description of the Related Art
Following fast development of computer manufacturing techniques in recent years, computer sales price has been greatly reduced as the computer usage rate keeps increasing. Regular computers include desktop computers and portable computers for different purposes. Portable computers have the characteristics of compact size and high mobility, however portable computers are not competitive in function and price when compared to desktop computers. Desktop computers have a relatively higher operating speed and better performance, however they commonly have a big size and are not convenient for movement. To solve the mobility problem, computer carts are created for carrying desktop computers individually.
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional computer cart. According to this design, the computer cart 10 comprises a chassis 11, and two adjustable retaining panels 15 bilaterally provided at the top side of the chassis 11. The chassis 11 has two sliding slots 13 extending in transverse direction and arranged in parallel at two sides. The adjustable retaining panels 15 each have two mounting through holes 151 corresponding to the sliding slots 13. Mounting screws 131 are respectively inserted through the mounting through holes 151 of the adjustable retaining panels 15 and the sliding slots 13 and then respectively screwed up with a respective locknut 16 to lock the adjustable retaining panels 15 to the chassis 11.
The chassis 11 has two angled bottom flanges 112 disposed at two sides, and a plurality of mounting through holes 192 cut through the angled bottom flanges 112 for the mounting of respective castors 19. The castors 19 each have a top mounting screw rod 194 respectively inserted through the mounting through holes 192 of the angled bottom flanges 112 of the chassis 11 and screwed up with a respective locknut 18.
Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the locknuts 16 are loosened from the mounting screws 131, and then the two adjustable retaining panels 15 are moved with the mounting screws 131 along the sliding slots 13 apart from each other for allowing the computer 14 to be placed on the chassis 11 between the two adjustable retaining panels 15, and then the two adjustable retaining panels 15 are moved toward each other and closely attached to the two opposite lateral side panels of the computer 14, and then the locknuts 16 are fastened up with the mounting screws 131 to lock the adjustable retaining panels 15. Thus, the computer 14 is firmly secured to the computer cart 10. By means of the castors 19, the computer 14 and the computer cart 10 can conveniently be moved on the floor to the desired location. When assembling the computer cart 10, special hand tools such as wrench and screwdriver are necessary. Further, it is complicated to adjust the gap between the two adjustable retaining side plates 15 subject to the size of the computer 14 to be carried.
Further, the computer cart 10 (the chassis 11) has a width much greater than the widths of commercially available computers so that the computer cart can carry any of a variety of commercially available computers, i.e. the chassis 11 has a nonuse zone 111 after loading of the computer 14. This nonuse zone 111 brings inconvenience in use, and greatly increases the dimension of the computer cart 10, i.e., the computer cart 10 requires much storage space when not in use or during transportation.